Category: the boy

You Probably Think This Blog is About You

4 Comments

Yesterday at the school, a policeman came in to gave a talk.  According to the boy, he talked about how he is there to protect us and he tried to trick them with a disguise.

Today, I heard more about the encounter from one of the assistants at the school.

The policeman showed the kids pictures of “pretty” people and “ugly” people. He asked them to say whether or not they thought the person looked “good” or “bad” based on the picture. (I can’t say I love the idea behind this lesson, and there’s much to be said about it but since it’s not the point of this story I’m just going to let it slide.)  The kids uniformly said the pretty people were good and the ugly people were bad.  I’m not sure what all the “ugly” people looked like, but I was told that one of them was a man with a mohawk and an earring.  All the kids called out “bad” when the card was displayed, except for one kid who yelled out “that looks like my daddy!” Indeed, her father sports a kelly green mohawk, piercings and tattoos.  The policeman then went on to say that we can’t tell if people are good or bad based on whether they’re pretty or not.

The boy shot his hand up into the air and was called upon.

“Also,” he said, “If they are too pretty, then they might be vain.”

And really, isn’t that the bigger threat?

*sniff*

4 Comments

Who would have thought that this would be the source of tears? It’s so cute!

Yes, that’s a toddler bed.  Where a crib once stood.  I posted the crib on CraigsList and it was gobbled up in a week, drop side and all.  (If you’re not a parent, you may be aware that drop-side cribs have all been recalled.  Then again, if you’re not a parent you probably have no clue what a drop-side crib is in the first place.)

But the crib is gone, which means that the little one is growing up and is not a baby anymore.  There’s a bit of me that’s sad about not having another baby in the house. (Grandparents, don’t see this as an invitation to remind me that another baby is entirely possible.  I’m done with the baby-making business.) It’s more that I can’t believe that my little baby girl is old enough for a bed.  It’s just so….grown-up!  The transition to a bed was seamless.  The first couple nights she got up and just walked over to the gate at the top of the stairs and stood there.  We went up to tell her that she needed to go to bed, and she toddled down the hall, back into her bed and fell asleep.

Yes, that’s it.

Don’t be jealous.  The boy gave us no END of trouble at bedtime, and still only falls asleep begrudgingly and usually in our bed.  I remember when there would be a couple hours of screaming tantrums at bedtime, eventually followed by silence.  We’d go to check on the boy and have a moment of panic when we saw nothing in the bed.  He’d taken his pillow and covers and gone to sleep in his CLOSET. Yeesh.  I’ve paid my dues in non-sleeping children.  That the girl is such an easy sleeper makes me feel so much better about myself–the boy’s terrible sleep habits have little to do with me as a parent, and are basically just how he is.  Of course, the girl’s wonderfully easy sleep habits have everything to do with my amazing parenting.

The next frontier…the potty!

Feast or Famine

2 Comments

You may have noticed that it’s somewhat feast or famine when it comes to the blog.  Two weeks go by and…nothing, then all of a sudden there’s three posts in a week.

As it turns out, this is a fairly good reflection of my work schedule.  As  a hospitalist, I work for somewhere between four to seven days in a row and then have a chunk of time off.  When I work it can be consumptive and then when I get to the breaks, it’s time for me to resume life as I enjoy it.  For the most part, it’s worked well.

Lately, however, work has been nothing short of oppressive.  Due to a convergence of circumstances, we’re short-staffed and busier than usual, especially for summertime.  I’m so frazzled by the time that I get home, that I can’t stand for anything not to go perfectly.  I mean, I leave work to go home and be with my family, which is what I really want to be doing, right?  But my four-year-old and two-year-old clearly did not get the memo and proceed to behave horrifically, which means that I spend the one hour I have with the girl  (who still goes to sleep at seven) and two hours with the boy–I spend this time irritated, annoyed, and angry.  Voices are raised.  Okay, my voice is raised.

Hospital work also occurs at a constant decibel level of about one trillion.  This means that when I get home, all I want is silence.  Again, my children did not get this memo either.  I really need to work on a more effective intra-home mail delivery system.

Of course, this all adds to the guilt I feel in that I’m spending so little time with them when I work.  In general, I don’t feel a lot of guilt as a working mom.  Almost all of the studies I’ve seen show that parents (stay-at-home or not) nowadays spend more time with their kids than stay-at-home moms (because back in the day there were almost no stay-at-home dads) used to.  For me, it’s important that my kids see that their mom works outside the home.  I don’t mean to discount stay-at-home parents at all, and I know that this is a sensitive subject, but for me personally I want my kids to know that both mom and dad can have professional careers.

But when I’m feeling overworked, the guilt really sets in.  I tear out of the house early, hoping that I can leave work earlier (which never happens) so I barely see the kids in the morning.  Then, when I get home, I’m so exhausted and in such a bad mood that I can’t even enjoy any of the time I have with them because the kids fail to act as if they’re in an episode of “The Donna Reed Show” and act like normal preschoolers, which involves a lot of screaming and the word, “NO!”

To add to the plate fullness, I’m training for a sprint triathlon, and the girl’s Montessori teacher has decided that she’s ready to potty train, which means that our laundry load has increased exponentially.

I do my best to turn everything around, and realize that in every negative there is a positive.  Perhaps my job is busy and stressful, but at the end of the day my work is meaningful and helps people, and moreover I have a job when so many are struggling to find one.  My kids may stress me out also, but this means that I have two kids, when some struggle to have any.  That I can train for a race means that I’m in good health and can find the free time to do so, even if time is tight.  And even the laundry means that I have clothing to wash, easy access to a washing machine, and constant electricity and water that I never have to think about.

I’ve been away from work for two days now, and the depression is just beginning to lift thanks to a combination of hanging out with friends, exercise, time away, and just remembering how much I love these little kids.

Tonight, the boy was sick.  Probably some generic virus, hot fever.  He called for me.  As he lay in bed and I daubed his forehead with a cool cloth, I said, “You know, kid, I love you more than anything.” “I know,” he replied.

I thought he had drifted off to sleep and I began to walk out of the room.  I heard a scratchy gravel voice call after me, “Mom, I love you so much too.”

And that sort of brought everything right again.

Rain dance

3 Comments

The other night, sitting on the porch watching the floodgates of the sky open and pour down, crashing thunder punctuating the rain.

The boy’s eyes open wide and he exclaims, “Mommy! I know who’s sending us all this rain!! It’s Indra!”

I reply, “No, I think he’s the sun god.”

“No, he’s the thunder god! I know he is!!”

I pull out my trusty reference guide, The Little Book of Hindu Deities, and dammit if the kid isn’t right.

Often, when he is upset or has been in a screaming match with me and gets sent to his room, I will go up a few minutes later and find him surrounded by his books on Ganesh, Hanuman, and the Ramayana.  He calls these his “God books.”

“Mommy,” he says, “I’m going to ask Ganesh to help me calm my body.”

Wouldn’t you know, it works.

The kid’s a better Hindu than I’ll ever be.

Chataqua Hike

4 Comments

Last Friday we all went for a lovely hike up at Chataqua.  It was one of those perfect Colorado summery days–hot dry heat and blue open sky.

The wildflowers peppered our walk with sprays of purple, white, pink and blue.  Our champion hiker # 1 led the way.

About halfway up the trail, there was a cairn shrine of sorts.

It reminded me of the incredible balanced rock sculptures that we’d see along the San Francisco Bay as we walked from Ghirardelli Square to to the Golden Gate Bridge along the water.  Once we even saw the artist plying his trade, so to speak.  He’d pick up a rock, turn it over so its pointiest edge was facing the ground, and gently set it down on top of a flat rock.  He would hold it in place, looking completely still, until he found the perfect balance and would let go.  It was as if he was stilling the rocks from within himself and waiting for a harmony to ring clear from the stones themselves.  It was heart-stopping, and if you’re ever in San Francisco you need to find this small bayside rock garden and wonder at it.

Back here in Boulder, the boy made his own cairn to add to the pile.

The girl, in contrast, did nothing to find the inner stillness of sandstone and instead did this:

See? This is a perfect representation of her personality. You know she’s going to throw the rock, she knows she’s not supposed to, but she has an expression that seems to say, “If I look as cute as possible, they won’t be able to get mad at me and I’ll get away with murder.  Or at least throwing this rock.”

She then threw the rock, and only got a mild rebuke, proving that we are well-trained parents.

As I was going through the pictures of the hike, I saw this one and my heart leaped–when did she get so big?! I even get a little teary just thinking about it. When did she get to be a beauty? When did she grow to be so tall?  Wasn’t it yesterday that she…was…smallllll?

Before this becomes the blog version of a musical, I’ll stop myself. 

Chataqua is a great place for the little ones, with lots to discover along the trails and is just challenging enough–I think we’ll head out there a lot this summer.  Any other hikers want to come along?  For the hiking-averse, I’d like to remind you that hiking is just walking, only you have to avoid the snakes, wasps, and bears you might find on the trail.

Garden Stage III

6 Comments

The garden is planted, save a second row of carrots, bush beans, lettuce, and some spinach (though it’s late for that, I know).

The trellis went up and we put out all of the starts where we wanted them to go.  My hope is that the climbing plants wind their way up the bamboo poles to make a structural focal point for the garden.  I also conscientiously picked plants that have unusual colors or feature to add interest.  For example, the cucumber is an extra long variety, and the pole beans are purple with purple leaves.  There’s a purple and white striped eggplant, a patch of rainbow chard,  and I planted a variety of tomato colors, in the hopes that when everything grows it will be an explosion of color to rival a flower garden.  Of course, that all depends on whether anything grows or not, since I didn’t pay any attention to how these plants do in Denver.  I purchased all of my starts from a neighborhood woman who grows them organically in her backyard.  Everything that I got from her last year grew amazingly well despite the crappy location.  I think it’s because she spends a lot of time hardening off the plants, so when they go into the ground outside they’ve got a better shot at making it.  (Local folks, if you want her info leave a comment or send me a note and I’m happy to pass it along.)

Clearly, the girl was impressed by my brilliant idea.  Her basic function during the planting was to act as reluctant cheerleader, occasional digger, and mostly a general hindrance.  But then she’d give you this super cute face and you couldn’t possibly be upset with her.

The boy helped by planting dahlias in the center section:

As for things growing, the pea sprouts from a few weeks ago are up to a good start:

And the final layout of plants ended up like this:

Oops, I forgot to add the spinach in the center of the trellis.  I read somewhere that you can put spinach in the middle of a trellis arrangement because it’s shaded and keeps the ground cool and prevents the spinach from bolting early.  It’s worth a shot since I’ve got the seeds anyway.  I put dwarf sunflowers and zinnia as well as flowering chives along the walkway to have flowers along the path, and also to grow some cutting flowers.  I’d love to have flowers in front of my house I could snip anytime I wanted to brighten up the house or take to a friend’s as a bouquet.

We looked into some grass borders as suggested to keep the grass from encroaching into the garden, but everything I found needed to be dug in before we had planted, and it was too late for that.  Ah well.  That just means more ripping out of grass this year and remembering to do it next year.

And now waiting, watering, occasional fertilizing, and crossing fingers! I’ll try to post picture updates every 2 weeks or so to follow how things are progressing.

Milestone!

5 Comments

Before I move on from the topic of the last few posts, I do want to clarify that I don’t think what B said to my son was racist, or that it means his parents are prejudiced in any way.  I mean, he’s four. He could have just as easily said, “I don’t like your shoes” and B’s father was probably right that he didn’t mean anything by using skin color, other than to be mean, which all kids will do at some point or another, even my precious little angels.  As adults, we know that race is a far more sensitive topic than shoe choice, but I don’t think that the little kids are necessarily aware of that.

Speaking of shoes (how’s that for a segue?), the boy can tie his own shoes now!! He desperately wanted a pair of lace up shoes, and we got him a pair of Converse.  He started doing the lacing work at school and can now tie his own shoes–yay, Montessori!  Here’s a short video–he’s so proud of himself.

You may have noticed that in the video he is wearing a three piece suit.

He LOVES this suit.  He wears it as often as possible, which is usually about twice a week, since we can’t do laundry much quicker than that.  He first started wearing suits last year, when he finally fit into a size 3T suit that my parents had purchased for him ages ago.  He wore that until it was in tatters, and my parents just bought him this new one, which he wears constantly unless it’s in the wash.  Whenever we’re in public, I feel compelled to tell others that he dresses himself this way and I do not force the kid to wear a suit.

Places to wear a suit you might not think of–

On the playground:

Riding a bicycle:

Climbing:

Or just going to school:

He’s my own little Alex P. Keaton.

Aftermath

4 Comments

Thanks to all who left such insightful comments, and those whom I spoke to in person.  We spoke to the teacher’s aide, whose face just dropped when we mentioned what the boy had said.  She told us the incident was over a month ago, but had happened basically the way that the boy related to us.  She had overheard them, and immediately talked to B about how different people have different skin colors but are all the same.  She then talked to the boy, too, and all seemed to be well until the other day.

I felt strongly, as did most people that both Eric and I spoke with, that we should talk to B’s parents and let them know what had transpired.

Eric caught up with B’s father as they were leaving school, and here’s how the conversation went, after pleasantries exchanged:

Eric: “A while ago B said something that really hurt the boy, and I wanted to let you know about it”

B’s dad: “Oh, what was it?”

Eric: “Well, he said he didn’t like brown skin, and it really hurt the boy’s feelings.”

B’s dad: “Oh.  Well, I’m sure he didn’t mean it.”

And then walked off.

The next day, B’s mom walked right by Eric in the morning without making eye contact or saying a word.

I was dismayed by this seeming utter lack of concern and even questioning–I mean, if someone ever told me the boy did something like that, I’d at least want to ask more questions about it to know what had happened and express concern for the other kid.  I can’t say I was entirely surprised. Even before Eric spoke with B’s dad, though, I steeled myself because I know from experience that when you approach people for conversations like this, the response you get is NEVER satisfying.  It was important for them to know, but I can’t control what they do afterwards. Who knows, maybe they’re working on some elaborate apology card for the boy at home, but I’m not saving any space on the mantel.

We also spoke to the teacher’s aide who overheard the conversation, and did say that we wanted to know if anything like that ever happens again.  We love her in general, but I do think she should have at least talked to the head teacher about what had happened–maybe they could have had some conversations in class, or songs, or something.  Now that I type that, I realize that I’m asking the teacher to teach something because I don’t think the parents are.  We ask a lot of our teachers, no?

In the end, I think this has been a good thing.  It’s made us more aware of the need to actively teach both our children about race and that despite living in what I perceive to be a fairly liberal, open-minded city that seems to have a lot of mixed couples, they will still have to deal with issues about their skin color.  Now that I think about it, it shouldn’t be that hard to talk about.  I mean, we talk about how there are all different kinds of families–two mommies, two daddies, adopted, etc., how women can do most anything that men do and vice versa, why not expand that to include talking about how people of different races can do anything, too?  It sounds sort of dumb to my ears to even say that as an adult, but maybe that’s what the kids need to be hearing.

I’ve got to think that it’s better than saying nothing at all.

Colorblindness

6 Comments

This morning, while brushing his teeth, the boy says, “Mommy, don’t I look white?”

I wasn’t sure what he meant–like, was he white from his toothpaste.  I asked him to clarify.

“My skin, it looks white, doesn’t it? Not brown.”

“Well, no, honey. It looks brown, and it will always look brown.” I said.

“You mean I’m never going to turn white?!” He cried, upset.

“No, you’re going to stay brown your whole life.” I was beginning to wonder where this was going.

“But, I want to be white! I don’t want to be brown anymore!!”

Oh boy.

“Why not, sweetheart? What makes you say that?” I asked.

“Because B—* told me he doesn’t like brown skin and that made me sad.”

Oy.

Eric walks over and says, “You are beautiful, inside and out.  You have a beautiful heart, and you are a wonderful person, no matter what color you are on the outside.”

I tell him that is true, and that sadly, he may always hear people say bad things about his skin.  “I think your skin is perfect, and I love it, and I would never want it to be any other color.”

This brings a big smile to his face, and we hug, and things seem to be fine again.

Po Bronson wrote a book recently called “Nurtureshock,” and while I haven’t read the entire book (and don’t know that I agree with everything in it based on what I’ve heard), the chapter about race is excerpted in Newsweek here.  In a nutshell, it says that the trend towards NOT talking about race at all or using phrases such as “everyone is equal” have the opposite effect, and do little to instill the colorblindness that they are intended to teach.  According to the studies cited, children as young as 6 months see racial differences, and certainly the 4 year olds in my son’s class do.

Still, what does it mean exactly to talk about race?  I’ve read the examples in the article, and understand those, but I have to think that there’s more than that.  It’s easy to talk about religious differences and say how people believe different things, but it’s not quite so easy to do that for race, is it?  I think the take home point is to make sure that you teach your kids that people DO look different, DO have different skin colors, but are all the same on the inside.

I’m not sure exactly what happened in the classroom.  The boy tells us that he told one of his teachers what happened, and we’re going to ask her about it tomorrow.  Depending on what she says we may or may not talk to B’s parents, but the truth is that the boy has an excellent memory and doesn’t make stuff like this up.  B’s parents are very nice people, and my guess is that they may fall into the category of people who simply don’t talk about race at all, and that it may not be something that they have to deal with much. I mean, I was recently called “the prettiest little colored girl she’d ever seen” by a VERY elderly patient, am asked on a regular basis “where I’m really from,” and have had people comment on how I “don’t have an accent at all”!  I’m quite certain that neither of B’s parents, both Caucasian, have ever had anything like that happen! Bronson mentions a statistic that most white parents don’t talk to their kids about race, and most non-white parents to.  He fails to mention that this is because if you are the majority race, you simply don’t have to deal with the same racial issues as someone of a minority race, and the questions are less likely to arise.

I think we handled it okay so far, but we’ll see how it goes with B’s parents.

And, on a side note, if there is a patron saint of parenting, could you PLEASE slow down on the difficult questions? What’s next? Where do babies really come from?

*name changed to protect the toddler.